Betta Fish Forum banner

Info: The Betta and the Shrimp

31K views 263 replies 41 participants last post by  Laki 
#1 ·
The Betta and the Shrimp

With just the singular betta inhabitant, sometimes the average fish tank can seem a little… empty. Many of us with small tanks often face this dilemma, to tank mate or to not tank mate?

In all reality, the greater majority of bettas do not need a companion. But let's face it, a seemingly lonely betta in one tank often makes us want to bring in another living creature to liven up the space. For a small cycled tank, say 1-5 gallons, a snail is often impractical due to it's rather significant bio load. Often times, that leaves us the only other invertebrate option - shrimps.

Let me start off by saying, if your tank isn't cycled, is a non planted tank and you are doing those 100% weekly water changes… skip this article, your tank is not made for shrimps.

If you are still with me, I am going to presume that your tank has a stable cycle and/or is well planted with good water parameters.

Let us explore some common shrimps option available to liven up our tanks.

Ghost Shrimp

We all think of the ghost shrimp as having an almost invisible presence in the tank. Some of us claim that they are a pain in the buttocks to keep alive. To me, they have the biggest personality amongst all my shrimps. I like to call them the "little thieves?" Why? Because they can pinpoint food from a tank's length away and missile towards the morsel. They will then proceed to snatch the food away from wherever it be located, whether it be from the substrate, another shrimp, snail or the betta's mouth, and scuttle back just as fast to whence they came to enjoy the spoils in solitary peace. Well, until another ghosty comes by… and the thieving game continues until the food is no more.

And to kill a common myth, yes, ghost shrimps do infact breed in fresh water.

Red Cherry Shrimp

One of the many variations of the NeoCaridina. The Neos consists of blue, white red and yellow variations and are one of the hardiest dwarf shrimps in the aquarium hobby. They can get quite pricy depending on where you are located, however, a good search in local aquarium clubs, or even on craigslist will get you some good deals on these guys.

I can only recommend full fledged females for the betta tank. These are the largest and have the highest chances of surviving a betta attack. I once made the terrible mistake of allowing a poor juvenile shrimplet slip from my net into the betta tank. needless to say, it barely had a second to enjoy its new found freedom in my NPT before it knew what hit it. And my betta, Kuro, certainly enjoyed a gourmet meal that night.

Amano Shrimp

Probably the safest choice for your betta's tank due to their larger size. Not shy, nor aggressive, these guys are known for being the true algae eating shrimps. Got no algae? no worries, they eat just about everything else as well.Like the ghost shrimp they can smell food from a mile away and will charge in like a tank on steroids. Infact, if you keep them too well fed with other goodies, they will ignore the algae all together. So if you want to clear up those unsightly black beard algae, invest in an Amano, and do not feed until they do the the job you commissioned them for.

Oh and did I mention that these sneaky things are great escape artists? Keep those tank covers on tight! You'd be surprised how far an out of water shrimp can go (and then you will find its dry shrimpy remains in an obscure area of the house =O true story)

Bamboo shrimp

These are exclusively filter feeders (see those pompoms they wave around?) and can easily starve in the common betta aquarium due to the lack of current and food in the water column. Personally I think of these as rather boring creatures. They could be a stick in the aquarium for all I know, and their sheer size takes away from the betta as the focal point in the aquarium. Not to mention, a fairly large tank is prefered.

So what kind of shrimps should you avoid?
Sometimes you will have Macrobrachiums sold as ghost shrimps. How do you tell the difference? Ghost shrimps are really not as invisible as we believe. if you look really closely, you will find that ghost shrimps have subtle orange marking on their whiskers and their tails. If you cannot see this after a through inspection of the shrimp, it's probably better not to purchase the "ghosty". The Macrobrachiums are aggressive shrimps and will attack bettas and other small aquarium inhabitants.
 
See less See more
#3 ·
Glad I found this post, I was just wondering about shrimp...just a question...do shrimp poop a high amount like BNP's??
My albino BNP makes quite alot, and I'm getting fed up with trying to keep my sand clean looking.. I vac twice a week, and this is a 20 gallon long.
I know I can't use a powerhead, but sure would like to since I have one not using right now, (was for bigger tank)...
I have a marine 20S slim, filter, but am considering a fluval C3.
any suggestions would be helpful...
I can't put my BNP is my other 60 gal, it has 2, plus a BRTS.. :)
 
#5 ·
amanos poop quite frequently. but their poop are like neat little pellets =D cherries and ghost shrimps are so small....

but generally speaking shrimps have a very very small bioload.

Think 20 cherry shrimps for 1 betta or something :p
 
#9 ·
I LOVE this thread! I was debating in my head whether or not I should get shrimp for my 40g I'll HOPEFULLY be getting for Christmas, although my dad came over to my apartment the other day and was gawking at my planted 10g so he really wants me to get a bigger one to continue my hobby (which HE got me started on when I was a child). I'm making it a sorority tank, and I think I'm leaning towards Amano Shrimp. It will be heavily planted (NPT) and I will have my 4 juvenile Emerald Corys in there as well, which are currently in the 10g.
 
#12 ·
I prefer the look of the Red Cherry (it would contrast well in a heavily-planted, green tank) but I heard they reproduce a lot and I don't really want a tank filled with shrimp! Do Amano shrimp breed easily?
 
#15 ·
Hmmm, so the Amano shrimp is the best I can get? or is it the Ghost shrimps?

I wanna get some bottom feeders for my Betta tank. He's in a 10 Gallon Filtered, soon to be live planted.
 
#17 ·
I have a ghost shrimp that lived for a few weeks in an unfiltered tank with two other shrimp and I think I only did one WC. One of them died two days after I got them, but I eventually moved the two remaining ones to my filtered 5 gallon while Fishie was being treated in a hospital tank for his fin biting. One of the shrimp died during that time but I never found its body. When I put Fishie back in a few weeks later, I moved the remaining shrimp to my unfiltered 2.5 gallon. He seemed to go missing for the time it was in there and I thought it died until I brought the whole tank to the sink one time to do a thorough cleaning and there was the shrimp! I decided to put him back in the filtered 5 gallon with my other betta. I totally thought he was going to get eaten, but he's still in there. I just saw him a few days ago (he disappears for days at a time a lot). It was the first time I saw him interacting with my fish. My shrimp was swimming up near the surface, and Fishie saw him and started drifting towards him, and when the shrimp saw my fish coming in his direction he did that thing shrimp do where they move so fast it looks like they've teleported to another part of the tank. lol.

When I eventually get my 50 gallon community/sorority, I think I'll get lots of cherry shrimp.
 
#20 ·
I Quarantine my ghost shrimp for two weeks, all that died usually do it in the first 24 hours. They were feeder shrimp so I am guessing their lives were not the best when I got them. I was so sad when I brought 6 and only 2 survived. But those 2 really thrived, I put them into the community tank and call them little adventurous shrimp. As they don't seem to want to hide as much and will sometimes swim around and try to take the food away from the fish. I got another set of 6 and one of them died during acclimation, which got me worried, but the other 5 survived well. They are all now inside the community tank being shrimpy and cleaning up after the messy danios.
 
#25 ·
I got 4 ghost shrimp for my fry tank: a week or so later, at least 3 are still going strong. Quasar was too aggressive for them, which was partly why I pulled him when the fry were 2.5 weeks old. Sad, he was such a good dad for those 2.5 weeks. Anyway, I've tried ghost shrimp with bettas before, but the ones I got were small enough to become dinner. These guys are almost full grown, and haven't bothered my fry or the apple snails in there. LOL, they do enjoy a baby ramshorn for lunch every once in a while, which they are more than welcome to!
 
#29 ·
I have 3 ghost shrimp which are turning out to be great companions to Arthur. He followed them around when I first put them in but now could care less about them. I think I may be getting another 3 ghosts to add to the tank. The best part is they clean any alge in the tank for me! and they look super freaky
 
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Top